1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus for processing image data, and more particularly to an image processing apparatus for editing compression encoded image data.
2. Related Background Art
There have already been proposed an apparatus for executing various image editings such as partial extraction of the original image, image enlargement, image reduction and synthesis, character or other information with the original image, by converting the original image information into electrical image data and applying electrical processes to the image data.
In such and apparatus, a compression process is often applied to the image data in order to improve the efficiency of transmission or storage, since the amount of image data becomes enormous when an image with tonal rendition or a color image is involved.
However the above-mentioned editing processes are executed only after complete decoding of such compressed image data.
The decoding of the compressed image data and the handling of the decoded image data of enormous amount requires larger equipment and a longer processing time.
Also the synthesis of plural images of different image formats is made after the format of at least an image is converted to that of the other image. Therefore the format conversion of an entire image requires a long period, and an image memory of a large capacity is required for storing the entire image after format conversion.